Altered Memories
by C.B. Magique
Summary: After finally returning to the Destiny Islands, Sora begins to feel the consequences of memory manipulation by Naminé and Organisation XIII. But since everyone believes that he's simply been on holiday, he has time to try to work out the scrambled parts of his heart. Meanwhile, Riku has returned to a world that remembered him all along. How can he explain his betrayal?
1. Sora and the Blue Box

Another side, another story... it's kind of a side-story-prequel to another fic of mine called Princess Story but since it's a prequel you don't have to read it - this story leads into it a little. It also ties in with the plot of Tidus' Adventures in Traverse Town very non-discrete, so know the basic concept of that one helps.

I don't really have much else to say about this. The plot, themes and style (which I'm experimenting with here) should all become apparent as you read, so...**  
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**Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, I am only borrowing the associated characters and locations for a piece of not-for-profit, recreational, fictional work. Disney and Square Enix take all of the credit for the characters and worlds they created.**

* * *

**Sora and the Blue Box**

It was an odd sensation – standing in front of his house again. Sora cocked his head to the side, wondering if the house had always looked so small. From the front it looked more like a little, wooden blue box with a dark grey roof but he knew that at the back there was a veranda and a balcony over that. It was still just a big blue rectangle, though. As he approached the front door he was overcome with the feeling that it was far too quiet. There was a niggling in the back of his mind, nagging him to remember something special about this house. Or was it something special about whoever lived inside the house? As his fingers curled around the black wrought iron door handle he paused. Who lived in this house again? Aside from himself, of course. He remembered living in this big (or was it little?) blue box but he couldn't live here by himself. He let go of the door handle and stood back on his heels, pondering for a moment. He should remember who lived there; he hadn't been gone that long. Sora shut his eyes and grabbed his chin, trying to think about who he lived with. He had parents, he was pretty sure but that was a given unless he was an orphan. Although he couldn't imagine a child living in this house by themselves. But there was still something missing, something familiar that he felt he should remember but somehow didn't.

Eventually he decided that he had to stop thinking about it. The more he thought the more confused he became and he wasn't finding any answers by just standing in front of the box. He grabbed the handle again and opened the door. It was unlocked. Sora blinked at the slightly ajar white, wooden door and suddenly felt a rush of epiphany as if he'd found a correct piece in a jigsaw puzzle and all of a sudden a whole bunch of other random pieces that didn't seem to make any sense all fit together. Yes, the door was unlocked and that was normal. In fact, everyone's door was unlocked. He could go up to any house anywhere on the island probably and let himself in if he really wanted to but at the moment the only house he wanted to let himself into was this blue box.

Sora pushed the door open further and stepped inside. There was no hall or welcoming front room of sorts. The house in nearly all of its entirely was immediately laid out before him in that first step. A tidal wave of blurry memories that seemed so trivial and irrelevant sped through his heart and mind as his eyes panned the house in front of him. There was just a big room. Two low-hanging ceiling fans spun slowly, one of them clicked incessantly in a way that irritated Sora. To his right there was a small two-person sofa in front of a TV and the space between them was filled with a mess of paper, crayons, building blocks and toy animals. Behind the sofa was an opaque sliding door that Sora remembered led into the bathroom and laundry room. The staircase beside it went upstairs and beside that was the kitchen, enclosed by its benches rather than by walls. The back wall and door was all glass louvers and flyscreen and Sora could see right through it to the sand dunes and down to the sea crashing onto the beach. Upstairs wasn't so much of a second storey than a loft space with a little balcony overlooking the rest of the house and doors leading into three different rooms. To Sora's left was a very messy area dominated by shelves that were half full of books and sewing magazines and half full of rolls of cloth and spools of string and wool. There were racks for clothes and a disorganised desk in front of a large window with needles and pin cushions and chalk and scissors and measuring tape. A chair was tucked in under the desk in front of a pedal-operated sewing machine.

Suddenly Sora realised exactly what he'd been missing; the thing that he should have remembered but didn't. That sewing machine. It was normally running most of the day. From morning to evening with only small breaks in between there was the constant rhythmic hum of the machine whirring steadily with the guidance of a well-practised seamstress. It should be running but it wasn't and that probably meant that whoever was supposed to be running it wasn't around.

Sora closed the door behind him and walked further into the house, looking up at the balcony. One of those rooms was his. He jogged up the stairs and looked down the little balcony hall. There were two doors in the wall and one at the end. Memories that he didn't know he had forgotten were returning with each step he took (or maybe he hadn't really forgotten, he just never thought about them and suddenly it felt strange to start thinking about them again). His room was the middle door. He turned the handle and threw the door open fully.

Everything was the same as he remembered and a little bit different. He still had the same bed, the same shelves, the same desk, the same toys and the same wallpaper. Everything was the same colour as he remembered it being. What was different though, was the state of things. He remembered leaving his room a year ago in a disorganised state. There were clothes and toys on the floor, shelves with nothing shelved in any particular order or with any attention to detail or neatness and there was a rather distinctive odour that he quite liked. He couldn't quite describe that odour; the only word that would even come close to a description of it was 'him'. Sora's room smelt like him. Although, memories resurfacing from the back of his mind showed him the face of an upset older woman looking down at him a bit crossly and telling him that his room smelled 'offensive'. Now it smelt clean. Brand new. There was no trace of any scent that would mark this room as a place that anyone had ever lived in. Between the order of the toys and the desk, the bed with its neatly folded sheets and the general cleanliness of everything, the room just seemed to be a display – a mere remnant or snapshot of something that was once there.

The familiar squeak of the front door being opened quickly and the sound of shuffling reached his ears. He turned around and looked over the rail of the balcony. A woman carrying two paper grocery bags in one arm was holding the door open for a small, red-headed girl in pigtails who was also carrying two bags, one in each arm. The woman let the door swing shut noisily and adjusted the bags so that she was carrying one in each arm. Sora thought that they were strangers to him but felt that he should know them well. Too many memories were playing in his head to make sense of any of them and he wasn't able to think before he blurted out something that somehow felt completely natural:

"Mom!"

The woman looked up and froze. Her eyes locked on Sora's and her arms suddenly went limp, dropping the brown paper bags she was holding.

"S-Sora?" she stuttered, blinking her eyes tightly and thinking that she was probably hallucinating.

Her voice was met in Sora's mind with an echo from a long time ago – the same voice saying the same thing to him. Sounds and images were whizzing past each other at incomprehensible speeds in his head so his only option was to trust his instinct and blurt out another poorly thought out sentence that also felt like a natural thing to say:

"You were gone all this time and you left the fans on?" Sora exclaimed incredulously.

The woman reached to her chest with both hands and clutched her heart. Sora's eyes widened when he saw her face distort in anguish and tears flow freely from her eyes. "Oh my gosh… Sora."

* * *

**You're my best friend if you get the not-so-subtle pop-culture reference.**

Now, normally I don't say this, but **please leave a review -^_^-**

It's usually my policy to just let readers be and if they think the story is deserving of a review they'll leave one but I think now I should start encouraging people to review because I've found that getting reviews is a mega-motivator and that people are more likely to review when prompted. I'll only ask this for the first chapter so that I can gauge if this story is worth continuing simultaneously with Princess Story and Tidus' Adventures in Traverse Town or if I should just delete it and wait until I finish one or the other before bringing it back.


	2. Riku and the Cage

**Riku and the Cage**

Riku glared at the dense, dark green foliage in front of him, wishing that he could just set it on fire. He glanced up and down the shady and deserted street. It was lined on each side by tall, dense vegetation. Walking through this side of town was almost like walking through the jungle. Riku sighed and looked down at the edge of the forest in front of him, scanning the junction between the plants and the road until he found what he was looking for: a brightly coloured mosaic tile. They were dotted all along the roadside on this street and others like it, all marking a bright path into the thick vegetation. This path was made of loose blue gravel. The colours of the mosaic and the colour of the gravel marked this as the right place. No matter how hard Riku had tried to forget about it, he could still remember every detail.

The gravel crunched under his feet as he walked up the path. It stopped abruptly at a small, lush, bright green lawn and in front of him stood the building that he had dreaded seeing again. It was a square one-storey house with wide eaves that was slightly raised off the ground so that it had to be accessed by the wooden steps leading up to the front veranda. It was angled oddly so that the front of the house was actually the corner with the veranda taking a sharp turn around it. At first glance there appeared to be no front door, just a wall made of wrought iron that was moulded to look like curling vines with a flower bud appearing every now and again. The walls on either side of the veranda were arranged in a zigzag alternating between patterned wire mesh and solid wall.

Riku crossed the lawn and climbed the stairs apprehensively, wiping his feet on a mat on the edge of the veranda before walking up to the corner of the curly bars. He wrapped his fingers around the barely noticeable handles and a short tug was all that was needed to pull two smaller rectangular pieces of the wall away and slide them apart. The inside of the house was dark, as it always was. The main area of the house was open and spacious but all around there were opaque closed doors leading into rooms and cupboards. The kitchenette at the back of the room followed the sharp bend of the house and the imposing jungle that surrounded the building could be seen through the awning windows. There was no television in this part of the house, just the bamboo furniture – padded with bright, multicoloured cushions and pillows – that surrounded a glass top table upon which there was a tasteful flower arrangement in a vase. There was no lack of art in the house. Between all the doors and sometimes even above them there were paintings, prints and sculptures. All of it was contemporary.

As well as the darkness there was silence and stillness in the house, which meant that either nobody was home or one other person was home and refused to be seen for now. That suited Riku just fine. He sat down on one of the sofas and leaned his arms on his knees, staring blankly at nothing. Even though he left the doors wide open he still somehow felt trapped.

Laughter and shouting broke through his thoughts and he stood up abruptly. He slowly walked over to the doors and stared out over the lawn to the edge of the path. The laughter came closer and closer until a small child broke through the foliage and raced across the lawn holding an ice cream stick tightly in one hand. He was chased by an older, taller child who was crying as he yelled for the younger one to give back what he took. The smaller boy got halfway across the lawn when he spotted Riku and halted, staring in awe at the tall, dark figure standing in the doorway. The older boy snatched the ice cream stick from the younger boy and wiped his tears with his hands. He was about to snap at the smaller boy until he noticed the wide-eyed stare in Riku's direction and turned. His own face contorted into very much the same expression. Another boy – a middle child, seeing as he was between the two on the lawn in terms of height – appeared at the edge of the path, looking impassive. He took one step onto the lawn and stopped there, noticing what was going on immediately and staring directly at Riku, even though the teenager's position in the shadows of the house made him difficult to see.

Riku stepped onto the veranda to get closer to the boys. They didn't move. In moving closer to the light the glare of the sun on their features diminished and he could see all of the detail and colour in their faces. They were all pale and silver-haired, just like him. All three of them had the same shade of green eyes, the same shade as Riku's. The eldest boy had short, wiry hair, the middle child had long hair with a fringe that almost obscured his eyes and the youngest boy had longish hair that was cut to the limit of his chin and partially veiled his face. Riku remembered them all so well.

He smiled awkwardly and waved to them, stepping off the veranda. The three boys all took a step back. Riku stopped. They remembered him, he could tell by the looks on their faces but perhaps they didn't believe what they were seeing.

"Hey, guys…" Riku finally said. "It's just me. It's Riku."

"Big brother?" the youngest boy said.

Riku chuckled slightly and put his hands on his hips. "Looks like you haven't been good while I was away, Kadaj. You're still picking on Loz," he admonished. He had hated this job; babysitting these three. He really hated it but seeing them again after so long – seeing them _okay_ – caused his heart to burst with relief and joy.

The eldest boy sniffled and held up the ice cream stick he now had, showing the dark 'winner' sign scored into the wood. "He was going to steal my prize."

Riku sighed. He now remembered why he hated being the oldest brother. "Loz, you're six years older than Kadaj and twice as big. You shouldn't let him p-"

The youngest boy – Kadaj – suddenly bowled himself into Riku's legs, wrapping his arms around them to prevent the oldest boy from going anywhere. "I hate you! You shouldn't leave us!" He bit into Riku's left leg, digging his teeth as deeply as he could.

"Ouch! You little…!" Riku growled, tearing Kadaj off by the hair.

"That's what you get for leaving us," Kadaj said, sticking his tongue out at Riku.

Loz approached slowly and wrapped his arms around Riku's waist gingerly. "We thought you were never coming back and you left us here alone."

Riku sighed, letting Kadaj's attack slide for now and putting a hand on Loz's head. "You weren't alone."

"We might as well have been," said the third boy. Riku stared at him in shock. It always amazed him that that one could move around without anybody noticing, even when he was in plain sight. He stood right in front of them, looking up expressionlessly. "We really hate you."

"Yeah and I've always hated you guys too," Riku replied, letting go of Kadaj's hair and gesturing for the third boy to come and join the hug. He accepted the offer and took Riku's other side, throwing his arms over Riku's hips. "I'm back, Yazoo. I'm sorry for hurting your feelings."

"You didn't hurt my feelings," Yazoo retorted. "Can't say the same for Loz, though."

Loz tried to hold himself back but he was still bawling into Riku's shirt and jacket.

"Sorry guys," he muttered.

"Riku," a sharp voice cut across the lawn, startling all three boys, even though it wasn't that loud. They turned their heads to the house where a new figure was lurking in the shadow of the doorway. "Welcome home."

Riku wrapped his arms more tightly around his brothers, feeling a protective instinct to pick them up and run. However, Kadaj smiled and poked his head around his oldest brother's legs to say:

"Hi dad! We're home too."


	3. Sora's Sweet Memories I

**Sora's Sweet Memories I**

Sora hurried down the stairs as his mother broke down into tears. By the time he had reached her she was already bending down to pick up her dropped groceries. The little girl also put down her burdens and was starting to place fruit and vegetables back into one of the bags. Sora crouched down by the other bag and started to gather the shopping before his mother could start.

"Don't worry, mom, I got this," he said with his trademark grin.

His mother stared at him, jaw hanging. She looked as though she didn't believe her own eyes and the prolonged gawking made Sora think that she was even too afraid to blink lest this really be an illusion. He looked away uncomfortably, focussing on putting the shopping back into their bags. A gentle hand on his arm startled him just a little bit and he looked back at his mother. Her eyes were wide and tears fell freely as her grip tightened and loosened, the gentle squeezing reaffirmed that what she was seeing was real.

"Sora… you're home. I…"

"Mom, it's okay," Sora tried to assure her.

"B-but…" she sobbed. "You were gone. Where were you?"

"Um… I was around," Sora replied vaguely.

"But you weren't."

"It's fine, mom." Sora put his hand over the one that was squeezing his arm. His giant hand almost engulfed her smaller hands entirely. She was an odd one on the island. Large hands and feet were quite normal among the population, although Sora stood out for his ridiculously exaggerated proportions. His mother also stood out for her abnormally diminutive proportions, especially for someone as tall as her. Her son smiled at her. "I'm home again. Everything's cool. We should put this stuff away right now."

Sora swept the rest of the groceries into their bags and picked one up. His mother picked up the other and they both stood. She smiled down at him and shifted the shopping bag into one arm so that she could wrap the other around Sora and rest her chin on his head.

"Okay, that's fine for now, then," she said. "You're back and for now that's all I need."

She looked down at him and Sora looked up at her with a grin. She nodded her head towards the kitchen and began to make her way over there. Sora's smile dropped off his face and was replaced with an expression of curiosity and awe. "I can't believe that…" he muttered.

"What?" asked the little girl, looking up at Sora.

Sora turned to her suddenly and blinked. He'd forgotten she was there in that short time. He turned back to his mother, already busy filling the cupboards and the refrigerator. "I grew so much this past year and my mom is _still_ taller than me."

* * *

Later that evening, Sora was in his room again, listening to the steady whir of the sewing machine that he'd almost forgotten combined with the crashing waves of the ocean right outside. He was finding that he room wasn't exactly the way he had left it. His mother had rearranged quite a few things while he was gone and Sora was now tasked with finding – and remembering – all of his books, toys and clothes (there was a stack of homework from a year ago that hadn't even been started). The clothes definitely had to go. They were all too small for him now, even his favourite shirt, which greatly dismayed him. The shirt was too big at the time that he left and that often garnered many complaints from his mother but he'd hoped to grow into it soon. It was sad that he'd already grown out of it by the time he returned. The toys and books brought a smile to his face though. He felt like a child again, looking at them all. When his body grew inside the pod he supposed his brain must have grown a lot with it because he felt too old for this stuff. He re-shelved his books and toys, leaving his adventure journal in amongst them, and turned around.

One toy caught his eye. A wooden ship hanging from the ceiling fan. He dragged his desk chair across the floor and parked it underneath, then stood on the seat so that he could look at it up close. He wondered why his mother hadn't put it away – it wasn't dusty so he knew she must have cleaned it too. Maybe she had thought that it belonged there or it looked fine right where it was. The female and male dolls that he had left hanging over the rails when he went away were relocated to a chest at the end of his bed but the boat remained. Sora knew he had to take it down, though; he wouldn't be able to use his fan otherwise. He found a pair of scissors to cut the string holding it up and brought it down to eye-level.

He remembered why it was up there:

_Some days before they had finished building the raft, Sora, Kairi and Riku were spending a rainy day inside. They had gathered at Sora's house for lunch while the fat, grey clouds clumped overhead and hoped that they would be able to get away to the play island before it began to rain but the downpour came so fast and so suddenly. They hadn't even finished lunch yet. In any case, Sora's mother forbade them to go outside, let alone to get in a boat on the sea, so Sora's bedroom was the last haven. _

_Riku gazed out of Sora's window and grumbled. "Stupid rain. I want to go and finish our raft." _

"_Mom said we can't," Sora reminded him, searching around his chest, pulling out a toy sword. "So the only place left is here. I've got one for you too." Sora tossed another toy sword on the bed where Riku was kneeling in front of the window. _

"_Hey, Sora, what's this?" Kairi asked, pulling a certain object down from the top shelf. _

"_That's a ship," Sora replied, standing up. "Dad built for me when I was little."_

"_It's great. I wonder if we could build a ship."_

"_We can't build a ship," Riku interjected. "We would need heaps of workers and lots of wood, steel and a special kind of canvas for the sails."_

"_I know _we _can't build a ship," Kairi said, "but what if we got to a world where we met a princess or a queen and became friends with them. Would they build us a ship?"_

"_Definitely!" Sora grinned. "And then we could sail to all of the worlds easily and have big adventures." Sora swung his sword around playfully. "And there's going to be one world where I become the hero after saving a town from a giant multi-headed monster!"_

"_Sora, this isn't a game," Riku reminded him. "You wouldn't be able to defeat a big monster by yourself."_

_Sora pouted at Riku. The older boy sometimes thought that his best friends didn't believe that they were really going to travel to another world. Kairi and Sora exchanged glances and Riku sighed. The playful atmosphere was killed, making the air feel heavy and sodden, just like outside. Riku's gaze travelled across his knees to the sword beside him. Struck with an idea, he picked it up. _

"_You can't defeat a big monster by yourself because you'll need my help," he declared, standing up on the bed and brandishing his sword. "But I think the most likely place that a giant multi-headed monster would be hiding is under the sea." _

_Sora and Kairi laughed jovially. _

"_Sure! And that's how we'll get our ship," Sora added. He took two white ragdolls from his chest and propped them up against the rails of the ship in Kairi's hands. "We're sailing along on our raft and then all of a sudden we hear a cry for help across the sea."_

"_We turn around and then there's this huge, magnificent ship belonging to a noble," Kairi continued the story, taking the boat and rocking it as she ran around the room, "but it's being attacked by a ferocious sea monster!"_

_She grabbed a blue lizard plush toy and chucked it unceremoniously onto the deck of the boat. Sora lifted his sword. _

"_I'll save you!" he shouted, leaping forward and stabbing the lizard, pushing it helplessly off the ship's deck. Kairi giggled. _

"_We're saved! We're saved!" she said in a high-pitched voice, meant to be the voice of the dolls. She moved their little heads as they talked. "Thank-you so much, kind warrior. You're our hero." _

"_It was nothing."_

_Riku saw the need for a new character in the story and pulled Sora's sheet off the bed, wrapping it around himself like a cloak. "Ha! Did you think it was going to be that easy? I am the Dark Lord Mercutio! That was my monster you vanquished."_

"_Hey, what happened to you helping me defeat the monster?" Sora interrupted. _

"_Seems like you defeated it just fine on your own," Riku said with a smirk. Sora was still frowning at him though. "Oh, c'mon! It's just a game, right? And now I, Dark Lord Mercutio, will use my magic to sink this ship!" _

"_No!" Sora screamed theatrically, jumping in front of the boat just as Riku pointed his sword at it. _

_Kairi laughed. "Now you're sunk, Sora. You're going to have to defeat the Dark Lord if you want to get above the sea again. These people could still be in danger, you know." _

"_Huzzah!" Riku shouted, pointed his sword at Kairi. The girl gawked at Riku. "I just turned the hero's girlfriend into a sea monster too. If you want her back you'll have to get through me."_

"_No way, Riku, that's evil, even for a game," Sora complained blushing at the role that Riku had arbitrarily given Kairi. He gave the girl a worried look as though she really would suddenly turn into a monster now. _

"_Why am I the 'girlfriend'? Why couldn't I be the sidekick?" Kairi protested. _

"_Too late, we've already written the story," Riku said. "But you can be the girlfriend-sidekick once Sora defeats the Dark Lord Mercutio. For now, you're a monster." _

_Kairi sighed but was for the most part content with the compromise. She took Sora's desk chair and a piece of string from his drawers to the centre of the room. She stood on the chair while she tied the boat to the ceiling fan, leaving the dolls in place. When she got down she quickly pushed the chair to the side and got down into a feral position, nails bared like claws and teeth gnashed. _

"_Why'd you put it up there?" Sora asked. _

"_Because we're underwater, remember? The boat is above us. Now just play the story," Kairi urged. _

"_I'll never let you get away with this!" Sora yelled at Riku in mock. He and Riku jumped forward and their swords clashed. _

"_Sora! Help us! The monster is attacking!" Kairi squeaked, jumping as high as she could to bat at the ship. _

"_You guys are ganging up on me! This is no fair!" Sora whined. _

"_Tough," Riku retorted. "If you want to be a hero on the high seas you have to learn that they won't always fight fair out there."_

"_And you still have to be able to win," Kairi agreed. _

"_Alright! Fine!" Sora decided and lunged for Kairi, swinging his sword at her. She broke into peals of laughter as she ran from his wooden weapon. He then turned and gripped the handle with both hands, slashing at Riku. The silver-haired boy blocked it but the loud clack of wood on wood showed that there was more power behind this attack. The boys began a swordfight in Sora's little room with Kairi standing around the side only occasionally remembering to pretend to be a monster. _

_An hour later the rain had slowed but didn't stop. They had already had enough of playing their game and any of the other games that they could think of. Kairi got up from a game of pick-up-sticks and left Sora's room, leaning over the balcony rail to call down to the woman on the sewing machine. _

"_Hey, __**…**__, I think the rain has almost stopped. Can we go out now?"_

"_It's still heavy," Sora's mother called back, "So no, especially since I know you're just going to get on a boat and go to the island. The sea is really rough right now."_

_Kairi sighed and returned to Sora's bedroom, shutting the door behind her. A quick deliberation followed in which the trio decided to sneak out through the window anyway and try to make it to the island. _


	4. Riku Lies

**Riku Lies**

"I thought that you'd never return," said the shadowy man on the veranda, walking out and stepping onto the stairs where he could be seen more clearly. He was a very tall man and very intimidating despite his svelte figure. He was darkly tanned, unlike his boys who were all as pale as the moon and his long, silver hair was combed back out of his face and tied elegantly with a ribbon. "It's good to see you home."

"I'm sure it is," Riku snapped back bitterly.

"It seems that we're all in agreement then," the tall man said. He continued walking forward until he was standing only a foot in front of Riku. He stared and Riku glared – eye to eye. "My, my, you've grown. How old are you now?"

"Sixteen."

"Aiyai!" the man exclaimed, genuinely taken aback. "And you're so tall. You're going to be taller than me."

Riku snorted. He didn't like this small talk. The sun was still climbing higher and higher in the sky and it was now beating directly down on them, illuminating the lawn like an enormous spotlight in the jungle.

"It's quite hot out. We should go inside."

"Yeah," Kadaj agreed, letting go of Riku and running around his legs to hurry up to the veranda and go inside. Yazoo was the next to follow at a more easy-going pace. Loz reluctantly let go of Riku and tried to wipe more tears away as he went too but the eldest remained rooted on the spot.

"You really should come inside," Riku's father said. "You don't tan like your lucky friends, Riku."

Riku turned away sharply. "I'm leaving."

"So soon? But you've only just returned."

That had Riku rooted. He knew he was being mocked. It was all he could do to not turn around and lash out.

"And exactly where have you been all this time?"

"Don't remember," Riku answered curtly.

"It would be a pity if you don't remember a year and a half of your life. Imagine… all of that time completely erased. And while you're still so young."

Riku's blood ran so hot that it started to freeze.

"So… how about the truth?"

"There's nothing else to say," Riku snapped. "I don't remember what happened and that's all there is to it."

He started to walk away but his father grabbed him by the arm with an iron grip. Riku turned and yanked his arm away. His father leaned back and narrowly dodged a fist to the face. His eyes went wide for a second before returning to the usual mildly amused expression he wore. "You're tall and strong… very strong. Now I'm very curious as to what you've been doing this past year and a half. Perhaps we can find a way to return your memories."

"I'm not interested in playing your games." Riku turned on his heel. "I'm going to see Sora and Kairi."

"Sora… oh! Right, Sora. He's been away too, hasn't he?" Riku's father remarked with a nod. Then, with genuine curiosity, he congenially asked: "Where has Sora been?"

Riku shrugged, his stare was fixed to the path leading away from the lawn to the street. "I don't know."

"He wasn't with you, was he?"

"No." Riku smirked because that just so happened to be true for the most part. "I'll be sure to ask him when I see him."

"Why don't you catch up with the family first? It's been a long time and the three little ones weren't really themselves without you, especially Kadaj."

This time Riku just marched away, unable to stand being civil to this man anymore.

* * *

Riku went all the way down to the jetty on the beach. He surveyed the surroundings, checking out how much had changed. The jetty had been lengthened and there were a couple of new houses in the area. The dunes had gotten a little bit bigger and a few boats were propped up against them. Two of those boats were half covered in sand. Riku recognised that these were his and Sora's boats. It took a while but after ridding the inside of his boat of all of the sand, Riku got it back on the water. It seemed seaworthy; there were no tell-tale signs of leaking. Satisfied with that, he picked up his oars and rowed all the way to the small island.

Getting closer, Riku decided to float in the shallows for a moment and admire the island for a little while. Nothing had changed there. It was like a time warp, the island that was only ever populated by six children and was developed by their hands. Riku remembered that it had started with the tree house. Sora's father had built that for them back when their parents didn't like the idea of them sailing across the sea to visit the island alone (that doesn't mean they never did that, though). Then Riku and Sora built their own little cubby house – the shack. Then Sora introduced Tidus to the island and the three of them built a jetty. Tidus invited Wakka and the four of them built a bridge to the paupu islet. Then both Tidus and Wakka invited Selphie and then they started and somehow completed a very ambitious project to build a deck. Then Kairi fell from the sky…

Riku suddenly realised that the tide was dragging him away from the island. He gathered his oars and rowed all the way up to the jetty. He moored his boat and noticed with a grimace that there was water at the bottom of it. There must have been a very obscure leak somewhere. He pulled the little rowboat onto the jetty and tipped it upside down, he wouldn't leave it in the sea, lest it sink.

The island was so familiar. The sand crunching under his feet felt the same as it did a year and a half ago. The delectable breeze coming off the sea felt the same as it did a year and a half ago. Even the paupu tree looked the same as it did a year and a half ago.

Someone was up there, sitting on the trunk of the tree. From a distance Riku could make out red, white and pink – it was Kairi. He made his way over to the islet and considered sneaking up on his friend. She seemed preoccupied with something. He quietly crept behind her. He crouched for only a moment just to make sure that she wasn't aware of his presence and then stood up suddenly with his arms raised like a monster and a roared. Kairi screamed and jumped off the trunk, dropping what she was working on in the sand.

"Sora!" she chided, turning around and seeing Riku's smirking face instead of the sunny smile she expected.

"_Bzzt_! Wrong," Riku replied.

Kairi sighed. "Sorry, it's just that that seemed like something Sora would do. I didn't expect it from you." She picked up the sketchpad and coloured pencils that she'd dropped and brought them back to the trunk. Riku climbed over the trunk and settled down, letting Kairi sit back in her previous spot. "Have you seen Sora today?"

"Not since we parted ways this morning," Riku replied. "Have you been home?"

Kairi held up the drawing materials she was holding.

"Clearly," Riku answered himself. "What's home like?"

"Well, dad was really happy to see me safe and sound. He freaked out when I went missing."

"What did you tell him?"

"I didn't tell him the truth. I told him that in those few days I was gone I was just camping on the island waiting for Sora. He was fuming mad."

"Why didn't you tell the truth?"

"What is this? Twenty questions?" Kairi asked teasingly. "I guess I didn't think he'd be able to handle the truth, or even believe it. Actually, I don't think he believed my lie. I'm scared. What if he tries to pry it out of me?"

Riku laughed. "Your dad? The mayor? No way. You should know your dad better than that. He might look kind of scary sometimes but he's nice and he's sensitive to others' feelings… not like my dad."

"Are you planning to tell your dad the truth?"

"No."

"Ha! Then you can't talk!" Kairi accused, pointing a finger at Riku with a smile. "You're such a hypocrite."

Riku didn't smile though, instead a frown settled firmly on his features. "I'm afraid of what might happen if I told my father the truth."

"But if I tell my dad the truth and Sora tells his mom the truth then your dad will find out the truth anyway."

"Then we should all keep it a secret." Riku mussed Kairi's hair light-heartedly. "Good job, soldier."

They both laughed out aloud. The noise didn't last and it wasn't long before it was quiet between the two of them again. They sat in silent companionship, watching the horizon and listening to the waves. Kairi eventually went back to her work in the sketchpad.

"What are you drawing?" Riku asked.

"Oh… nothing," Kairi replied, sketching in a petal of a flower.


	5. Sora's Dawn

**Sora's Dawn**

A loud _bang_ ripped Sora out of his memories of the boat game. He put his ship down and ran out of his room in a hurry and a panic. The sewing machine had stopped. He hoped nothing terrible had happened and just as he was about to leap over the balcony rail to get downstairs quickly, he stopped. He remembered now. He sighed with relief and shook his head at himself, feeling silly for having believed that his mother was in grave danger. He took the long way down via the stairs and went straight to the kitchen where his mother was crouched on the floor trying to pick something up. She'd dropped the heavy iron stew pot… again. The little girl in pigtails had also come running down the stairs and went straight to his mother's side.

"Lemme help," she said.

"No, no, this is too heavy for you," Sora's mother insisted. "I've got it, don't worry."

"You dropped it again," Sora muttered, as if this was the first time he'd seen it, even though he knew this happened very often.

His mother smiled at him. "I had it on the edge of the bench and I was a little careless. Don't worry, it's not like it broke the floor."

She put the lid on it and lifted it up, her free arm was held out to the side and knocked the handle of a sharp knife that she'd been using to cut a root vegetable. Sora's breath got caught in his throat as his mother and the little girl squeaked and jumped back, narrowly avoiding a cut.

"Whoa, let me help with that," Sora suggested, going forward and picking up the knife. He took it over to the sink to rinse it. "You should be careful, mom. That could have hurt someone."

"You could have hurt yourself," the little girl added.

His mother sighed. "You two… I'm fine doing this by myself, I promise."

"Maybe… but you always drop stuff."

Sora nodded. "I'll help you out. I haven't got anything else to do anyway. My homework is so overdue it's not worth doing anymore." That got a chuckle out of her.

"I'll help too," the little girl offered, going over to a drawer where Sora believed more knives were kept.

"Oh, no," his mother said quickly, grabbing the little girl and dragging her away from the drawer. "No, you're not allowed to use the knives until you're older. Here, if you want to help right now, why don't you set the table." She opened up the cupboard where the plates and bowls were kept and the little girl picked up two plates. "We need three now, sweetie."

The little girl looked up at Sora's mother in surprise and then turned to Sora. She stared at him for a moment before nodding and picking up another plate.

"I'll finish cutting these vegetables," Sora said, going to the chopping board. He took a look at the four vegetables and the three herbs that had been chosen for the night's meal. The sight of a particular bulbous vegetable made him cringe. "Mom! Do we have to have this?"

He held it up for her to see. She put her hands on her hips. "Oh, Sora. Why is it like you've never left," she said with a small, sad smile. "It's good for you, so yes, we have to have it. Come on, you said you were going to help with the cutting, so cut."

She took the iron pot to the sink and poured a little bit of sauce into the bottom before carefully measuring out three cups of water. Sora quickly finished cutting up all of the vegetables (needing some stern encouragement from his mother for the one he didn't like) and the first one went into the pot. Sora's mother placed the pot over the cooking fire and left it to boil.

"Thanks, Sora," she said, giving him a hug and a kiss on the forehead. "I'll call you back down when it's ready, okay?"

"Mom!" Sora groaned, pushing away.

She giggled. "Aw, you don't even want a welcome home kiss from your mama?"

"I'm not a baby, mom." Sora rubbed the spot that she'd kissed with a pout. It felt embarrassing, even though nobody was watching. "Are you sure you're okay to finish it by yourself?"

She just laughed and pushed him away. "Oh, just go."

Sora returned to his room but he really didn't have anything to do. All would be quiet in the house while his mother focussed on her cooking so he sat on his bed and watched the waves roll onto the beach in the dark dusk. He leaned on the window frame, looking out towards the play island that was little more than an indistinct silhouette against a dark backdrop where the first stars were starting to twinkle in. Something didn't feel quite right, not with the islands or his mother but with himself. There was so much that he was only just beginning to remember and still so many things that he didn't quite know. In his memory he knew Kairi had called his mother's name. Why couldn't he remember what her name was?

His gazed panned across the sea and settled on the horizon. The sun had already sunk but that thin edge between the sea and the sky clung to light for as long as it possibly could. It was nearing the end of the twilight period and when the light disappeared completely Sora knew it would be welcomed back gladly at dawn.

"_Hey, Dawn, I think the rain has almost stopped. Can we go out now?"_

That's right. His mother's name was Dawn.


	6. Riku's Clash

**Riku's Clash**

Kairi and Riku came back together later in the afternoon. They said their goodbyes and afterwards, Riku looked down the beach in the direction that he knew Sora's house was. He still remembered which one it was – the blue one. He could see it. He considered paying Sora a visit but decided against it. His father would be angry at him for walking off without a word like that.

He found his mosaic tile on the street and was about to disappear into the undergrowth when someone made him stop.

"Riku? Is that you?"

He turned. That sweet voice like a tiny bell was familiar. A pixie-like woman was approaching his house from the other end of the street. She was very small and tried to relieve her shortness with three-inch high heels but even that height boost didn't bring her to the average height. Even Selphie was taller than her. She had milk-white skin and silver hair that was pinned stylishly. Her clothes, accessories and make-up were all fashionable and in excellent condition, giving the impression that she was a walking doll. She walked up to Riku slowly with wide-eyes and a slack jaw. If her purse wasn't hanging from her shoulder she would have dropped it.

"Yeah, mom, it's me," Riku replied.

He stood stock still as she approached, reaching out to him with a delicate hand. She touched him on the arm briefly and her fingers snapped back as if she had just been burnt. Warily she uncurled them and touched him lightly. Her hand on his arm was solid and his flesh against her palm was just as real. She pushed him just to make sure. Riku was always stronger than her (at least in his memory he was) but now he was like a boulder to her; completely unmoveable.

"Why… you came back," she whispered. She took a sharp, shuddering breath and her hands suddenly dove into her purse to find a handkerchief.

"Don't cry mom, it'll ruin your make-up," Riku joked but the tears were already rolling down her cheeks. She had never been able to help it. She wore her heart on her sleeve every day and every small action would elicit an emotional overreaction of some kind.

"That's okay, I can reapply," she said, finishing with a sad sniff as she dabbed away the black tears of ruined mascara and eyeliner. "But… but… I never thought you would ever come home. You disappeared so suddenly without a trace and now… now…"

"I know… sorry." Riku reached over and pulled his mother in for a hug, one that she forcefully returned. Her nails dug into his sides painfully and he thought his waist must have been squeezed a bit narrower, that's how tightly she held him. She dug her face into his chest, sobbing uncontrollably. Her lipstick and eye make-up was going to stain his jacket, he knew, but he could wash that out. His mother needed this.

It could have been ten minutes or an hour before his mother's grip finally loosened; Riku wasn't keeping a check on the time. He now had to steel himself to meet with his father again. This wasn't going to be good. Walking in with his mother beside him didn't give him extra confidence.

A light in the living room had been turned on to combat against the fading daylight. The twilight had come quite quickly and it would be over within half an hour – the evening didn't last long on the islands. Riku gazed with a heavy heart at the scene inside. His father was nowhere to be seen but the three 'little ones' were there. He could see them through the decorative cage wire running around the living room even though all four boys knew that they were strictly forbidden to do that. He could already hear Kadaj's shrieking laugh – he was always the loudest of the three and he was the one doing the chasing this time. Loz was his partner in crime now (this was rare) in a combined effort to try to catch Yazoo, which was odd because Yazoo normally didn't like playing games that involved physical exertion. Riku thought he caught a glimpse of something shiny in Kadaj's hands and hoped that that wasn't what he thought it was.

His mother took her shoes off on the veranda. Riku heard her sigh in audible relief since he knew she had to stand up for very long periods of time in the job that she did. High heels really weren't a practical choice of footwear but she was very sensitive about being so short. She put them down haphazardly on the floor, hopefully planning to pick them up later. Riku's father was very finicky about tidiness.

"Boys," she said in her sternest voice, which sounded only fractionally more threatening than her usual voice, "stop it. No running around the house."

_Snip, snip. _

Kadaj brandished the shiny pair of scissors and ignored her, leaping over the couch. Yazoo fled quickly, twisting up his hair and holding it over his shoulder. Loz got in front of him and grabbed him. Kadaj was close behind.

"Boys! Running with scissors is dangerous!" their mother scolded.

It took Riku only a few long strides to reach Kadaj before he could do any damage. He grabbed the little boy by the wrist holding the scissors and lifted him off his feet. He took the dangerous blades away and then dropped him mercilessly from one and a half feet off the floor. Kadaj sat on the floor and pouted at Riku.

"You ruined the fun, meanie," he whined. "We're just playing."

"Torturing your older brother isn't playing," Riku snapped. "Learn to respect your elders, brat."

"Yeah," Yazoo chimed in.

His mother sighed with relief again. "Thanks, Riku. You always know how to deal with them best. I should get dinner started."

Kadaj blew a raspberry. "Now I'm bored."

The rattle and crash of the screens being pushed apart violently made everyone jump and turn to the front door. Riku's mother scurried from the back of the living room to retrieve her shoes before she could get a scolding. Kadaj got up off the floor and stepped back so that he stood in a small huddle with two of his brothers. Riku glared at his father standing in the doorway. His sharp eyes pierced right into the eldest boy's soul. He slowly strode across the room towards Riku with the rest of the family watching on in uneasy silence. He halted right in front of Riku but the silver-haired boy refused to take a step back or look away.

"Are you going to speak now or will I have to beat it out of you?" his father threatened.

"Aram, that's-" his mother started.

"Silence!" his gaze flickered briefly to her. She flinched and turned to get to the kitchen and start what she'd decided to do.

Riku chuckled and crossed his arms. "Even if you did beat me I wouldn't talk."

Aram reached out suddenly. Riku pulled his head back but not quick enough to stop his father from clutching a handful of his long hair. He grabbed Aram's wrist and squeezed hard, a silent promise that bringing this to a fight wouldn't end well.

"I always knew you were insolent," Aram hissed, "but this is a whole new level of audacity for you. I know you didn't forget what happened in your disappearance; you're different."

Riku kept his eyes narrowed and glared hard. He had so many snarky comebacks to that but he knew that saying any of them would give away the truth. The pressure on his scalp lessened as his father let go of his silver locks. A silent truce was made when Riku reciprocated the action by letting go of his father's wrist. Aram strode past him, saying in a low voice:

"I need your experience. At the road block I've reached it's sure to advance my research."

And that was one of the things Riku was afraid of.


	7. Sora and the Missing One

**Sora and the Missing One**

Sora idly played with his little wooden boat. He lay on his back using a pillow to prop his head up on the backboard while he titled the boat dramatically back and forth over his stomach like it was sailing over high, rough waves. Every now and again he stopped and tilted it a different direction so that he could examine it. It was quite beautifully and accurately crafted. It was intricately detailed or decorative by any means; it was built simply and sturdily for a child to play with. It was his father's gift to him – a present for his fifth birthday when he and Riku first began to conjure up dreams of travelling over the sea. He wondered when his father would be back. Would he be here in time for dinner? He tried to imagine his father's face but for some reason all he could picture was a black shadow and a bright, sunny smile. He put the boat down on his bed and let it lean against the wall while he crossed one foot over his knee and folded his hands over his belly.

The night wasn't all that warm so Sora hadn't even needed his fan anyway. The light attached to the fan's motor was switched on, illuminating the room in a friendly yellow light. Everything in his room was bright, blocky and simple – simply built, simply arranged, simply coloured. In a way, it was still a five-year-old's room. A year of complete disappearance didn't make up for how far behind his room was. However, now that he was home, he had the time to work on that. There was going to be no more Heartless, no more Nobodies, no more Organisations and keyholes of any kind, he could relax again.

But the boat still bothered him. Sora hoped his father would be home soon so that he could meet him again and fill another of those gaping voids that he was finding all over his memories. Why was it so hard to remember him? Sora remembered being close, he remembered being taken to the islands on his father's boat sometimes with Riku, sometimes without. He was a carpenter and a craftsman but the former was his official occupation. The man was just generally good with wood. If it involved the carving, sawing, shaving, nailing, jointing, bolting and treating of wood, his father could do it. He was the one who made the wooden swords for Sora and Riku but he'd made them in a special way so that they were stronger than any other child's wooden sword, Sora didn't know how. Almost ten years later, the swords were still battle-worthy. Actually…

Sora got up and crawled down to the end of his bed where his chest of toys was. He opened it and peered over the lid at the neatly packed up toys in there. The two swords were laid across the top of all of the other items, darker in colour than when they were first crafted but otherwise exactly the same. Sora picked one up and tested it with a few quick swipes. The crisp _whoosh _that came from the blade was satisfying to hear. Sora suddenly got the idea to leap off his bed and bring the sword swinging down. He did some training manoeuvres around the floor of his bedroom, practicing the various fighting techniques he'd learnt over the course of his journeys into the cosmos. He grinned, enjoying the sound of the sword slicing through the air. He was much faster now, much stronger and more agile but the wood didn't bend with each swing. Sora couldn't help but laugh at the irony. He was almost a master at sword-fighting now with all of his experience with the Keyblade and this toy sword was still worthy of the powerful strikes and swipes that he could muster.

He jumped up, swinging the sword up in a long uppercut and then: _CLANG_!

He landed and looked up with wide eyes and a cringe. The ceiling fan wobbled and the blades rotated slightly from the force of the blow. Sora swallowed, feeling like he just been caught doing something awful like vandalism. He stood stock still for a while, just observing the fan and relaxed when he realised that it had taken its undue punishment well and hadn't taken any damage.

"Sora, what was that noise?" his mother called up from downstairs. Sora didn't move, not really wanting to admit what he did. After a pause, she added: "Dinner's ready by the way."

Sora discarded the sword carelessly on his bed and eagerly left his bedroom. Dawn was putting the stew pot down on a thick, straw placemat in the middle of the table and the still steaming contents had a heavenly scent that made Sora's mouth water. She smiled when she saw Sora lingering in the threshold between the living space and the dining space.

"Come on, sit down," she invited him, pulling out the two chairs closest to her. The other chair was already occupied by the little girl. Their dining table was small and round, perfect for about four people, five at the maximum and maybe if they squeezed, six or seven. There were four plain chairs, matching the plain design of the table and yet there were only three places set. Sora frowned at that, recalling what his mother had told the little redhead not even an hour earlier. Did his father not come to dinner anymore?

Dawn went back into the kitchen to fetch a ceramic dish that was sitting on the grill at the back of the open fire oven. She didn't own a pair of oven mitts so she handled it with two folded up dishtowels. There was another thick, straw mat on the table where it would be placed but as she walked back to the table holding the dish by the rim the clay slipped between cloths. Dawn gasped in horror. The little girl almost jumped right out of her seat. Sora dived and slid on his belly, reaching out and catching the dish before it shattered on the floor. He yelped in pain as the hot dish burned his hands and dropped it immediately but the crisis had already been averted; the dish and the food inside it were saved.

Dawn let out a sigh of relief. "That was close. How are your hands, Sora? Let me see."

She dropped the dishtowels and kneeled next to Sora as he sat up. She took his hands and forced him to hold them palm up. They were red but he hadn't been holding on for long enough to get a severe injury. "Put your hands in the sink and run some water over them," she instructed sternly, getting up and pulling Sora up with her. She dragged him into the kitchen and put his hands in the sink for him. "I'll go and see if we have a potion somewhere."

A potion would help but a panacea would do better, Sora thought as the refreshing flow from the tap soothed his burn. He refrained from saying that aloud, though, since he knew the panacea hadn't yet been invented on the islands.

Dawn hurried to the bathroom and came back with a small, green tub containing a potion in salve form. It was more useful with shallow, superficial wounds and healed them faster. It was almost empty. Sora turned off the tap and let his mother apply the cream. It was light blue and sparkled like an ordinary potion and it tingled on his skin in a pleasant way. When the burns were covered she closed the tub and set it on the kitchen bench to be put away later and turned around. She gasped and dashed back to the kitchen table. Sora turned around quickly, wondering what had got his mother so flustered so quickly. The little redheaded girl had moved aside some of the plates and cutlery. She'd taken up the dishtowels and while Dawn and Sora were preoccupied she'd moved the meat dish from the floor was now struggling to get it onto its mat. Dawn peeled the girl's hands away quickly and put the dish in place herself, scolding the girl as she did.

"You could have burned yourself if you'd dropped it!"

"I didn't drop it! You're the only one who keeps dropping stuff in this house," the little girl retorted.

Dawn sighed. "Oh… I suppose so. Right, why don't we just sit down and eat?"

"Aren't we waiting for someone?" Sora asked, coming back from the kitchen. He looked over the dinner table, noticing only three places and one of them was for him.

"Who are we waiting—oh… Sora, how could you forget?" Dawn said, folding her hands in front of her.

Sora gulped and stared at his family with wide eyes. Dawn's mouth was pulled tight and the little redhead sat on her chair, staring at her feet as she swung her legs. He didn't quite understand. What could he have forgotten—oh… that's right, how could he have forgotten?

* * *

**Note: I'm using the panacea in this chapter as if Sora had known all about it throughout KH2, even though it was only introduced in 358/2 Days and BBS, which I think is an adequate reason to assume that the rest of the series can be retconned to include this item.**


	8. Riku's Little Ones

**Riku's Little Ones**

Riku didn't talk during dinner. He hardly ate too. By the end of it he couldn't get away fast enough and hid away in his bedroom. The door had a deadlock on it, which he'd installed himself to keep the family out when he didn't want them. He looked around his room.

In all honesty, he couldn't really say that it was _his_ room anymore. Everything that he'd owned had been either thrown out or moved somewhere else (he didn't know which). It was a small room with a polished wooden floor and floor to ceiling glass louvers that were left only slightly open. The bed was pushed into the top right corner with the head at the window, just the way he liked it but it no longer had his sheets on it. Instead it was fitted with plain blue sheets and looked like a generic single bed. It definitely was the bed he used to sleep in but he'd grown so much in the past year and a half and the bed looked so small now. Would he even still fit on it? The shelves that were nailed to the left wall were empty, as was the chest at the foot of his bed. One of the drawers underneath his bed had a spare set of nightclothes that Riku found fit him just fine but were probably not meant for him at all. His desk was gone. The only thing in the space next to his bed was a small, three-legged table with an alarm clock radio and a reading lamp.

Riku turned off the light in his room early and changed into the comfortable night clothes, leaving his daywear in a haphazard pile in the middle of the floor. He lay back in the crisp, clean sheets that had never actually been slept in and reached back to pull the louvers right behind and above him further open. He lay still and awake for hours. Outside an owl hooted. It was a new one, Riku could tell. Before he'd left the islands there was an owl living in the jungle around his house that hooted enchantingly every night. It seemed to have moved away now. Riku sighed in disappointment. While he knew that owls came and went he did like that particular owl and its mesmerising sound. Every now and again there was a rustle as the wind blew, the call of a different bird, the singing of a gecko or the crunch of an animal crushing leaves and twigs as it walked. Riku wished he'd been back for the rainy season when the rhythmic pitter-patter of rain drew out the frog choirs. With a relieved sigh he realised that now with the Organisation XIII ordeal over he would be here for the next rains and the rains after them.

The new resident owl hooted at varying intervals with varying tones and pitches like it was composing a song. Riku smiled as he listened to it, growing fonder of it with each passing minute. He didn't even realise when he fell asleep.

* * *

Riku's eyes snapped open. The night was quiet but the moon had moved over in the sky and was now shining right into his room, bathing everything in a milky-white glow. He wasn't sure what had woken him all of a sudden and sat up confused but then it happened again:

_Rap, rap, rap!_

Sharp knocks on the door. It didn't take long for his visitor to get impatient and start loudly pounding the door repeatedly like a drum roll. Riku threw the covers back and hurried over to the door, unlocking it and opening it. He knew who it was before he was able to see. He glared down at them. Three identical pairs of eyes stared back at him cutely, blinking innocently. The pale children seemed to glow all over in the moonlight.

"What's the matter with you?" Riku hissed, directing the question at Kadaj. "Do you want to wake mom and dad?"

"No, just you," Kadaj replied cheekily.

"Why are you here?"

"Can we come in?" Yazoo asked.

"Why are you here?"

"What? Don't you like us anymore, Riku?" Loz said, voice hitching a bit at the end.

Riku glowered. He already knew why they were here but he'd found that his bed definitely wasn't quite big enough for him anymore, at least not lengthwise. "You aren't going to fit. You all have your own beds, go sleep in them."

Despite his retort, Riku didn't close the door on them. Kadaj frowned.

"It's hard to sleep," Yazoo admitted. "Everything feels tense now that you're home."

"But we missed you," Loz added.

Kadaj tried to dash around Riku but the older brother caught him by the arm and held him back effortlessly. "If I'm the problem, why come to me?"

Three pairs of eyes shifted uncomfortably. Riku sighed and turned to make his way back to bed, leaving the door open. He knew the answer: they weren't welcome. The three little boys stood by the door unsure of what to do. As soon as Riku was back under his sheets Kadaj scurried across the room and jumped on him. Riku let out a small "oof!" but Kadaj's small body was hardly enough to wind him. Yazoo and Loz squeezed in beside him, forcing Riku to squash himself against the wall. Even so, Yazoo was almost lying on top of him and Loz seemed to be hanging onto the edge of the bed for dear life. He didn't remember it being this squashy, even with the three of them. Then he reminded himself that a year and a half ago he was about half as big as he is now.

The owl hooted its song to the stars.

"Shut up, dumb bird!" Kadaj yelled out the window. Riku flicked his arm up and smacked him in the nose.

"Go to sleep or I'll put you outside like a dog," Riku threatened. Of course, it was empty – his threats to his little brothers were always empty but Riku's poker face and occasional shows of strength were enough that the three boys never picked that up. Now that his arm was free and not bolted to his front by Yazoo'a body, Riku reached over both of the children beside him and pulled them close, hooking his hand securely under Loz's waist. He felt the second oldest relax even though Yazoo squirmed at the extra tightness. Kadaj folded his hands in the crook of Riku's neck from his comfortable position on top of his big brother and used Riku's shoulder as a pillow.

The rest of the night was warm and silent as the brood slept.


	9. Sora's Sweet Memories II

**Sora's Sweet Memories II**

Sora didn't sleep well that night and when he awoke he felt sick. How could he have forgotten? His father hadn't been home for years and nobody knew where he'd gone. The memories of the day were fuzzy, they stopped and started in his head. At first all of the words and images didn't go together right and at times were indistinct as though someone had tried to edit a film and done so horribly wrong, even forgetting to properly synch the audio. Every inch of the island had been scoured, some people – especially his workmates – even took a few days off work to help look for him but there was no trace left.

Suddenly he sat up in bed. There was something in the house that he'd forgotten to look for since it hadn't crossed his mind earlier. He flung himself out of bed and burst out onto the balcony, surveying the room below. It wasn't there. He sighed and hung his head as another memory quickly lit up in his head. It was strange… his memories were there, mostly sound and correct but why didn't he remember them? It took rather obvious prompting to bring anything to the surface and this one was no different. Shortly after his dad disappeared, they'd sold it. They sold their piano.

It was still early in the morning; the sun only just begun to glow over the horizon. Dawn wouldn't wake up until the first real rays peaked over that razor edge. Sora didn't feel like going back to sleep so he trudged downstairs. At the bottom of the staircase he turned to his left and looked at the living room wall. It suddenly looked so empty now that he remembered what used to be there. A beautiful, dark wooden upright piano. He dragged his feet to the empty wall and turned his back to it, slumping against the plaster and sliding down to the floor. He pulled his knees up to his chest and hugged them, staring blankly into the room.

The silence settled over the house like a thick blanket and a melody began to play inside his head. An old, jaunty song from years ago that had him swaying slightly where he sat. He remembered sitting in front of the black and white keys while his father's rough fingers pushed them up and down…

_Sora was always amazed by his father's hobby. The way his fingers scaled the keys was mesmerising. His skill with the musical instrument was tantamount to his skill with woodwork. In the afternoons when he returned from work the first thing he do was give Sora's a hair a playful pull and ask how his day was (when Sora was much younger his mother would joke that that was why his hair was growing so spiky) and then take a shower. The second thing he'd do was sit down at his piano and play. _

_The notes filled the house every night, drowning out the drone of the sewing machine. He was so good at it Sora wondered why he didn't play piano for his living instead. Those times were peaceful, blissful. There were nights when Sora would sit beside him on the piano stool and listen and watch while his father played his favourite piece for him. Somehow, the tune seemed so foreign, like nothing else he'd ever heard on his world. A lot of the music his father played was like that. Sora would sometimes close his eyes and imagine a different world shaped by the notes his dad played. Some of those worlds were underwater, some of them sat weightlessly in the clouds. His favourite one, however, was a dark little town, brown all over and paved up completely with cobblestones. There was no sun, no moon, just a dark night sky and glittery stars overheard. Despite the darkness, the town had an atmosphere of gentle warmth like a fire on a cold night. _

"_Dad, how did you learn to play piano?" he once asked. _

"_I started when I was little – about your age," his dad replied, looking down at his young son, "and I practised lots and lots. Do you want to start learning?"_

_Sora shrugged. Playing piano was of no real interest to him, he just liked listening to the music. "How did you learn the songs?"_

"_People write music for instruments and musicians learn songs by reading the music and then playing."_

"_You're not reading music now," Sora pointed out. The music stand bolted to the piano lid was empty while his dad was playing his favourite song. _

_His father chuckled. "I've memorised this one and many others. They're my favourites."_

"_Why did you learn it?"_

"_I heard it somewhere and spent a lot of time trying to find the music for it. I was glad that I eventually managed to."_

"_Why is it different to so much other music?"_

_His father looked down at him with a quizzical expression. "All music is different. Songs aren't ever the same. Even if the same song played by two different people those two versions will be different in some way." _

_Sora scrunched up his nose. None of those were the answers he really wanted to hear but his little five-year-old mind wasn't sharp enough to realise that he hadn't asked the right question to get the answer he wanted. "_Where_ did you learn that song?" was what he wanted to know. Why did it sound different to the typical island music? _

_The piano wasn't just a special spot for him and his father, it was also special for his mother. Sometimes she sat in his place on the stool with her arm around her husband's waist as he played something slower, more romantic and more intimate. Sometimes they'd lean on each other and whisper sweet nothings, which made their little boy gag. Sometimes they all squeezed together on the stool as much as they could (usually that meant Sora had to sit on his mother's lap) and enjoyed the piano as a family. His father would make them play simple progressions of notes and chords to make simple duets. It was fun. It was beautiful. _

After he went missing his mother had to expand her business to sustain the family. Repairs and alterations didn't bring in enough money so they sold a few of their things so that she could buy more material, more cotton and more needles to turn her clothing repair business into a proper tailor shop. It was necessary for their precious piano to go.

"Sora? You're already up?"

Sora looked up. His mother was leaning over the balcony in her pyjamas, which consisted of a singlet and a pair of shorts. Sunlight was streaming into the house through the window in front of her workstation. He just nodded, shifting a little bit and finally noticing that his legs had gone to sleep.

"Let's get breakfast," he suggested.

Dawn sighed and made her way down the stairs. She realised that that specific spot on the floor that he was sitting on was special. The way he had curled into himself communicated all she needed to know. He remembered now. Sora's legs were wobbly as he got up. Dawn stopped at the foot of the staircase and watched him amble past her towards the kitchen. Something was different about him. Something had definitely changed. She swallowed thickly. It was hard to place and she knew the reason why. The reason terrified her, embarrassed her; she hoped she'd never have to speak about it or admit it to him at all.

Up until recently, Dawn hadn't remembered Sora either.


	10. Riku and Tidus

**Riku and Tidus**

Riku woke up before anyone else in his house and left early after a meagre breakfast of cereal. His little brothers slept like logs, even as he shifted to get out of bed when they were sleeping on top of him like that. It was still a bit dark out. Hardly anyone else would be out and about at this time of day. What could he do between then and now?

He walked purposefully down his street with the intention of going to the beach. He had decided to take his boat to the little island and attempt to find and plug the leak. Hopefully, it would only need a bit of tree sap. As he got closer to the main part of town the jungle disappeared and opened up into a tropical grassland. Most of the houses were built here since this was a more construction-friendly location only for lack of trees. It made up for not having the difficulty of vegetation by having a rather sheer topography. It was nothing compared to the valley on the north side of the island but it took someone with reasonable fitness to make it from the beach to the mayor's house, located higher than any other.

Kairi lived there, Riku recalled. The mayor was her adoptive father. However, Kairi wasn't likely to be awake this early in the morning and even if she was, she would probably be leaving or had already left. So Riku took the lower path heading down to the beach.

* * *

After collecting a bucketful of tree sap, Riku sat himself on the end of the small jetty of the play island with his boat at his feet. He pushed it down into the sea, hoping the pressure would force water into to leak so that he could find out where it was coming from.

"_Aha!"_

There it was – the tell-tale drip. It was seeping through the bottom of the boat from a tiny hairline crack. Riku kept pressing. The amount of water he'd found in his boat yesterday couldn't have come from just that one little crack, there must have been another. A year of neglect surely would amount to more than that.

Suddenly the boat leaped out of the water. Riku gasped in shock but (to his own relief) didn't scream. He quickly scuttled backwards, pulling his feet onto the jetty and stared between his knees at his boat suspended in the air by a jolly fifteen-year-old blond boy. Riku scowled at him. He just laughed.

"Mornin', Riku," Tidus said with a grin.

"Hi."

Tidus put the boat down beside him on the water, keeping a hand on it so that it wouldn't float away. "Hey, it's been a while! How's it hangin'?"

Had Tidus been hanging around Wakka's family too much? Riku didn't remember Tidus having that hint of a northern islander accent. He sat cross-legged and glared at Tidus. The boy was so different now. Riku's family seemed to still be the same, including his little brothers but it had taken a while for Riku to recognise Tidus. He was taller, tanner and bulkier and he'd gotten his left ear pierced. It looked like he was going to rival Riku's physique.

"I was having a wonderfully productive morning until you showed up," Riku snapped. His gaze flickered over to his bucket of sap. He hadn't tipped it over in his scramble.

Tidus shook his head, sending drops of sea water everywhere. Riku growled and threw his arms up to block the water.

"Hey! Watch it!"

Tidus chuckled. "What? Did you think I didn't mean to do that?" he asked. He stuck his tongue out.

Riku sighed in exasperation and looked around. Odd. His boat was the only one at the jetty and there were no others grounded further up the beach. He looked at Tidus while the younger boy was tying up Riku's boat for him. "Tidus, how did you get here?"

"I swam."

Riku gawked. "Swam?"

He looked over to the main island. It could have been up to a kilometre away, nobody had really ever bothered to check. Tidus was soaked to the skin but he was still fully clothed. Riku narrowed his eyes.

"I don't believe you. I think you've docked your boat on the other side."

Tidus laughed at that. "You can go check it but I promise it ain't there. I swam all the way here, bro. I'm doing it for Blitzball."

"What's Blitzball?" Riku asked.

"It's this new thing, right, this new sport that me and Wakka came up with," Tidus explained excitedly. "Right, we made up this game that's like playing football but underwater and the coaches at school said it sounded pretty cool and that we should totally make it happen so next year an official league is going to start up and as one of the inventors of the sport I have to be one of the best. Every day I catch the morning high tide and swim all the way from my house to here. I'm getting really good at it. I only had to take a breath once this time."

"That…" Riku stammered. That was impossible. Tidus' house was at the village's westernmost edge in the mangroves. It was smelly and muddy, even at high tide, and he'd have to navigate around the thorny tree roots while avoiding sharks and crocodiles and the poisonous mangrove snakes and eels. And then he had to swim more or less a kilometre to get to the little island. There was no way anyone could do that in two breaths. "That's absurd! You liar!"

"I ain't lyin'. I'm trying to stay ahead of Wakka. He still needs to take three breaths to make it here."

"That's also impossible!"

"Shows what you know, 'cause I just did it." Tidus shrugged and climbed onto the jetty. His clothes – a heavy pair of dark overalls and a yellow cotton shirt – were so saturated that they poured water as soon as he stepped onto the jetty. Riku's eyes widened when he saw Tidus stamp his feet onto the wooden boards in bright yellow rubber-soled sneakers. Surely, Tidus was lying. There was no way he could swim all the way from his house to the island in two breaths with his clothes and shoes on.

"Even I can't make it across the sea without a boat," Riku said, glowering at him as the sodden boy sauntered past.

"Things change, man. You haven't been around for a year and a half." Tidus clasped his fingers and put his hands behind his head. Suddenly he stopped and turned around with a big grin. "How's it feel to not be top dog at everything around here anymore?"

Riku tried to keep the sour look off his face but the inside of his mouth tasted like he'd just sucked on a lemon. He didn't understand why it felt that way, though. Tidus was lying, he had to be. There was no other explanation.

Something was swinging by Tidus' left hip. Riku's eyes wandered down to it curiously. It was a scabbard. It was the same colour as his overalls, which explained why Riku didn't notice it before but the sword hilt at the end looked foreign. The hoop-shaped pommel had a piece of drenched red fabric tied to it. Tidus tapped the scabbard at his side.

"Notice something different?" he teased. He drew the sword and as it emerged there was a flash of blue light. The base of the hilt bubbled and foamed and then solidified when the whole hook-shaped blade was drawn. It must have been an illusion but the blade seemed to be flowing like water. "Check it out. I managed to get a hold of this baby while you were gone. I wonder how it stacks up against your toy sword."

"How did you get that?"

"C'mon, challenge me. If you win I'll answer any question, no strings."

Riku growled. He didn't have his wooden sword on hand and by the looks of Tidus' new weapon it was magical. He'd never seen anything like it on the islands, though. The magic weavers didn't yet have the research or the technology to make magical weapons of the calibre that Tidus was holding, or had that changed too? Somehow, Riku doubted it. A year and a half wasn't enough time to advance that much. The wooden sword would be easily cleaved in two in a fight against Tidus' new weapon but he did have one that would stand a chance. He glanced around the beach. It was completely empty but he was cautious. He pointed up the beach.

"We'll go around to the other side of the island and fight there," Riku announced, standing up.

"Where's your sword?"

"You showed me your magic weapon, so I'll show you mine. But I don't want anyone else catching a glimpse of it."

Tidus burst out laughing. "Dude! Do you have any idea how kinky that sounded?"

Riku swiftly stepped up to Tidus, twisted him around by the shoulder and kicked him in the back of the knee in one fluid motion. The blond was brought down to a kneeling position. He looked up just as Riku was crossing the jetty in front of him. The silver-haired boy looked down over his shoulder at Tidus.

"Stop running your mouth, moron. See you on the other side of the island."

Tidus huffed. He glared at Riku's broad back as the older boy walked away proudly. He got up and followed begrudgingly. Even though nobody had been around to see that, the bruise that was forming on his ego was painful.

* * *

**Because logically, Blitzball should be impossible.** Anyone who played FFX should remember that Wakka allegedly swam around an island five times with one breath.


	11. Sora and The Mayor

**Sora and the Mayor**

Sora was panting by the time he made it to the top of the hill. It was still early in the morning so he figured Kairi wouldn't have left home yet. He stopped to catch his breath and swallowed to wet his throat while he leaned on the low fence. Then he stood up and faced the mayor's house. It was actually a fairly quaint little house with white walls but the roof was so dramatically angled that it looked like someone had turned a few boats upside down and used them as roofing. There was a wooden deck before a door that was placed under a round window. Sora stepped up to the door and knocked twice.

The door opened immediately, drawing a squeak out of Sora. He looked up at the tall man standing in front of him. He was about as tall as Riku with the same fair skin and silver hair but with blue eyes instead of green. The mayor was only half dressed in casual slacks, since it was early and not a work day. Despite the fairness of his body, there was something darker about his presence that always made Sora feel half as small. It wasn't a menacing darkness like the kind that possessed Riku or the kind that Maleficent and The End of The World exuded. It was an awe-inspiring darkness, more akin to the coolness of having a deep reservoir of knowledge and wisdom. The mayor's eyes were so deep you would never see the bottom of them.

"Morning, Sora," the mayor said gruffly. "What do you want?"

"Uh, um," Sora said, shifting his eyes around to avoid looking directly at the mayor. "I just wanted to see if Kairi was around, that's all."

"She's still asleep," was the curt reply. "Most people are – it's a rest day."

"Yeah, I kinda noticed." Actually, he didn't. If he wasn't in school Sora had no idea when weekends and rest days came around since his mother often worked through them to finish orders before deadlines. "Can I wait here until she's awake?"

"You'll be here a while if you do that."

The mayor really didn't provide any room for argument. Sora stood on the doorstep while the mayor fiddled with the simple gold band he wore on his left ring finger, a habit he would probably never break. They shared a tense silence during which Sora fidgeted and cast his gaze around the garden, not really looking at anything in particular. He just didn't want to be looking at the mayor. The man had a way of being fiercely intimidating without even meaning to. Almost like Riku.

"However, since you're here, how was your trip?"

Sora blinked. His head whipped around to stare at the mayor. "Trip?"

"Yes," the mayor said, creasing his brow. "You've been away for about a year now. Was it a good trip?" The mayor turned his gaze away slightly and stared into space for a moment as if something had just come to him and he needed to mull it over. "And where did you go?"

"Oh… I… went to a lot of places," Sora answered nervously, rubbing the back of his neck. "A lot happened and… some of it was good."

The mayor's crease got deeper. "Yet some of it was bad?"

It was phrased like a statement but it was definitely intoned as a question. Sora didn't answer immediately. He was stunned for a moment. If even the mayor didn't know that probably meant that nobody knew. Nobody had any idea of where he had been for the past year and a half. Of course they wouldn't remember the half-year he spent on his first adventure but nobody had any clue about his disappearance for the rest of the time and the mayor seemed quite nonplussed about it.

"I spent a lot of time just missing home and missing my friends," Sora offered as an excuse, hoping the mayor bought it. "It's pretty tough when you suddenly have to go away for a long time, especially if all you've known for your whole life is the little island that you lived on, right?"

"I see, homesickness." The mayor beckoned for Sora to follow him as he stepped out of his house and crossed the deck boards. The sun had just come far enough over the mountain ridge and treetops to wash the boards in warm, morning light. The mayor sat down at the end of the deck beside the stairs, looking down to the sea. Sora sat next to him and clasped his hands between his knees. "Tell me about the places you went."

Sora stiffened and gulped. "Uh, well… there were lots of cool places. There was a time where we were, uh, hiking! Yeah, hiking in a jungle. With gorillas. It was pretty cool. And there was also a safari. There was also this place that had a nice hedge maze." He added under his breath: "it would have been nicer if the queen wasn't so mean."

"Queen?"

Sora jumped and his hands flew up like a defence shield. "We just called her the queen," he lied quickly, "because she liked to be in charge all the time. And, um… a desert. I saw a desert for the first time. And snow too! I saw snow for the first time. I didn't think it would be so cold. And when it was falling – that was just, wow."

The mayor nodded but he still looked confused. "I… see… I suppose. And who did you go with? I don't remember anyone else going with you."

"Anyone else?"

"You keep saying 'we'."

"Oh… oh!" Sora forced out a laugh that he hoped didn't sound too fake. "Yeah, there were some others. I met them on the journey, they didn't leave the islands with me."

The mayor narrowed his eyes, glaring suspiciously at Sora. "You know, now that you mention it, I don't actually remember you leaving. I remember you building a raft with Kairi and Riku before you left but you can't have gone on that because Kairi was still here. And then Riku disappeared without a trace. Did he go with you?"

"Um, yes!" Sora said, looking straight at the mayor and nodding his head vigorously. "He was there. Yeah, I remember, we had all sorts of cool adventures."

Sora tried to keep the happy façade up but his heart was dropping into his stomach at the mayor's expression. He was confused before but now he was clearly suspicious. Sora's vague story didn't make sense in a lot of ways. Sora shuffled a bit and turned to look at the horizon, trying to avoid the mayor's stare.

"Would you like to come inside? I was just about to make breakfast."

Sora's whole body suddenly felt hollow. "Er… no. I've already eaten."

"Just some tea, then?"

"No… no, I'm fine. I'd rather just wait out here."

"Really?" The mayor fixed him with a hard stare.

"Y-yeah. I'll just wait for Kairi out here so that we can go out to play."

The mayor chuckled but it was a mirthful sound. Sora looked at him curiously. "Sorry," the man said, "but it's strange hear a person your age saying that they're going 'out to play' as if they were a child."

Sora turned back to the view wordlessly. The mayor's banter didn't make him feel any less dreadful inside.


	12. Riku and the Missing Half-Year

**Riku and the Missing Half-Year**

Tidus' water sword clashed with The Way to Dawn. Riku slid his Keyblade up the blade and caught it in the hook. He swung it over his head, tearing it out of Tidus' grasp. It sailed through the air and stuck fast in the sand behind them. It was mid-morning now and both boys were sweating from their swordfight. There was a bleeding rip in the right leg of Tidus' overalls where Riku had cut him and Riku's left shoulder was still feeling the sting from being hooked by Tidus' sword.

Riku stared at Tidus. He raised the Keyblade as if he were getting ready to battle again but he knew it was over. Tidus's gaze darted between Riku and his sword.

"I've disarmed you. This fight is over," Riku declared.

"Not if I can get it back!"

Tidus dashed to the left to get to his sword. Riku was just as fast (and he'd expected something like this too). He tripped Tidus over. The blond fell face first in the sand. Just as he lifted his head up to spit out the grains Riku stabbed the Keyblade into the sand right in front of his face. He froze.

"It's over," Riku reiterated, putting a heavy foot on Tidus' back to drive that point home. He smirked. "I win."

Tidus groaned and let his face fall back into the sand.

"Hey! Guys!"

Riku looked up immediately at the sound of the feminine voice. He'd thought for a second that it was Kairi (because he briefly forgot that he knew any other girls) but when he looked he saw Selphie waving at him from the other side of the beach. She jogged over to them with a smile as sunny as the shade of yellow she was wearing. Riku let Tidus go so that the blond could get up. Selphie giggled at the sight of both of them and slipped her hand into the large pocket on the front of her dress to procure two potions.

"Aw, thanks Selph'! You're a life saver!" Tidus said, taking one of the potions and tossing it back with one gulp. The rip in his flesh glowed with the instantaneous magic as it sealed the wound shut. Riku glanced at his shoulder. In the heat of the fight he hadn't bothered to take notice of it too much but now he could see that it was a nasty jagged wound that was bleeding heavily. He took the second potion and downed it.

Selphie giggled and her grin almost reached her ears. "You're totally welcome. You boys are up really early today. I was saving those potions until later since I knew someone would inevitably get hurt in battle or something but I didn't expect it so soon. What's the wager this time? Is it money? Are you two insulting each other again?" All of a sudden she gasped dramatically and covered her mouth with both hands. A sly look crept into her eyes and her voice was muffled by her hands when she said: "Is it a girl?"

Riku rolled his eyes. "No. The wager is secret."

Selphie turned her full attention to Riku and suddenly that sunny-faced demeanour became subdued. "Yeah, that was silly of me to suggest it. You've only been back for a day, right? I saw Kairi yesterday and she told me that you and Sora were back. Where have you been?"

Riku gulped but tried not to visibly flinch. He could tell by her tone that that question was directed solely at him. He tried to change the subject. "It's a long story. And why are you here this early? I've never known you to be a morning bird."

Selphie nodded her head in the direction of the sea line. "I came because of the tide. It's gone low so I wanted to see if I could find some neat stuff before it came back in and everything got washed away. But you didn't answer my question. Where did you go? Kairi was pretty upset, you know."

Riku looked at the sand and nodded. "I know."

"Did you at least tell her where you've been?"

Riku nodded again. Selphie returned the nod sternly. She looked like she was proud of him and he beat down the urge to roll his eyes at that. Kairi knew a lot more about where he'd been than Selphie could ever imagine and she thought that Kairi was ignorant.

"It's good that you did that, at least," Selphie said. "It was terrible seeing her so depressed like that for a whole year. Will you tell us anything about where you went? Even a teeny bit?"

Riku frowned at her, eyebrows furrowed. Something about what Selphie had just said didn't sit right with him. She cocked her head to the side expectantly as he continued to say nothing.

Suddenly, Tidus blew a loud raspberry. "Of course Riku isn't going to tell us. It's always a big guessing game with him. Hey, maybe we can get Sora to tell us where they went when the storm hit."

Riku's glare snapped from Selphie to Tidus instantly. "What are you talking about?"

Selphie sighed and leaned her head on her hand, resting her elbow in her other hand. "Tidus, you over exaggerate everything. That 'big, dark storm' you keep going on about was really just torrential rain."

"Seriously, Selph', I don't think you and me are thinking about the same storm," Tidus said.

"Whatever," Selphie said, rolling her eyes. "You're just being dramatic."

"No, really! It was that big!"

"It was not!"

Riku turned to look at the horizon disinterestedly as Tidus and Selphie bickered. He figured he would just wait until they both realised they were being stupid but something else still didn't feel right. It was nagging him like an itch under the skin that made his hair prickle. Something that the two of them had said… what was it? Riku glanced back over to the two of them. Selphie was nagging Tidus about a "poor memory", which he huffily protested as he picked up his sword. That's right, Riku had wagered a question on his battle with Tidus. Where had the sword come from? There was no way he could have possibly gotten it from the islands.

The conversation had changed. Riku could tell because the tones of his friends' voices had changed. He didn't bother to tune in, he didn't really want to. Selphie and Tidus (Wakka too) only ever had idle, boring things to talk about. Or at least, that's the way Riku had always seen it. Their lack of ambitions as big as his meant that he didn't really get along with them as children and they had been sceptical of his plan to travel to other worlds on a raft (although in retrospect, that was probably a good thing). They were friends with Sora, mainly. Other than that, Riku had no reason to pay any attention to them. Wakka was unremarkable in all respects. Tidus was a typically arrogant sporting child who excelled at a made-up game and nothing else. Selphie was an airy girl with a head full of made-up stories and not much else. He had never bothered with any of those three before because they had never been on his radar for anything. In a way it felt odd to be interested with any one of them.

In the end, Riku thought that he might as well claim his prize before Tidus went and forgot about it. He approached the two of them and as he did their conversation became clearer, even though he wasn't really listening.

"Do you really think you have to hold your breath for that long?" Selphie asked.

"Totally! The way we set it up, right, the field isn't really all that big but you'll be swimming in swirls and circles a lot. We did some tests and we figured you could quickly swim up to a kilometre without even realising it. And you can't take a breath until the ball is out of play. So, yeah. I've gotta be able to hold my breath all the way to this island. Ha! When I got here this morning Riku couldn't believe that I was that good at it. He even thought I was lying. Haha! You should have seen his face, Selph'!"

"I'm not all that surprised. I wouldn't believe you could do it if I hadn't seen you training at it so hard all year."

"Yeah right! I'm sure Riku's just jealous that I can finally beat him in something. Ain't that right, Riku?" Tidus turned to Riku and grinned. "Can't handle a little change of tide?"

"_You haven't been around for a year and a half."_

Riku stared at him wide-eyed. A terrible chill ran through his core at the same time as something else bubbled up hotly. He lunged forward on impulse and grabbed Tidus by the collar of his shirt roughly, lifting him off his feet. "Why?" Riku growled.

"Riku? Stop!" Selphie exclaimed.

"Whoa! Dude, chill," Tidus said, dropping his sword and showing his hands in surrender. "I'm sorry, really! Didn't mean to hit a really sore spot."

"No, I mean…" Riku took a deep breath. He set Tidus back down on the sand but didn't let go. "Selphie, you should leave."

"What? No! Not when you're getting like this all of a sudden," Selphie argued, running up and trying to get between them but Riku refused to move. "Let him go."

"Only when he answers the wager."

"The wager?" Tidus echoed.

"You said you'd answer any question if I won the battle."

"Oh yeah. What, do you wanna know why I'm so good at holding my breath?"

"No. I was going to ask about the sword but I think this is a better question: why did you think I was gone for a year and a half?"

Selphie sighed. "Riku, Tidus is terrible at anything he needs his memory for. He probably just lost track of time. Everyone knows you were gone for only a year."

Except that Riku knew he'd been gone longer than a year and he knew the reason why the Islanders wouldn't remember. Tidus glanced over to Selphie unsurely. That was all Riku needed to see. "I think he meant what he said. Where did the extra six months come from?"

Tidus gulped. "I think that's technically a different question…"

"You know what I'm asking. Why did you think I was gone for an extra half-year?"

"Riku, stop it!" Selphie shouted. She slapped him in the face hard enough to turn his head. The clap resounded across the beach as sharp as the sting on Riku's cheek. He let go of Tidus and the blond stumbled out of Riku's reach. "Why are you so mad? Tidus is just being stupid like he always is."

"I'm not being stupid!" Tidus said indignantly.

Riku slowly turned his head back to look at Selphie. His face was frozen in wide-eyed, slack-jawed bewilderment. Selphie glared at him defiantly with her arms akimbo.

"Are you back to your senses now?" she asked with a snap. Riku blinked and looked down at the sand. He nodded. Her sighing made him look at her again. Selphie crossed her arms and her eyebrows slanted down in a more doleful expression. "Really, can't you talk to us about where you were for the past year? It seems like it was pretty bad."

"Yeah… yeah, it was," Riku admitted before turning on his heel to go back to the other side of the island. He didn't turn to look or bother to wait for Tidus and Selphie's response.


	13. Sora and Kairi

**Sora and Kairi**

It looked like it was going to be a beautiful day. Going to the beach was an excellent idea. The sky was clear blue as far as Sora could see, even though the only direction he was looking was up. He was barely aware of it getting brighter and brighter as the sun came up and he dozed a little. All of a sudden, a face framed in blood red hair appeared in his field of vision. Sora cried out in alarm. He jumped and sat up quickly, startled into full alertness. The girl behind him giggled at his expense. He turned around and looked up at her with a playful pout.

"Hey! That was mean, Kairi."

"It wasn't that mean," Kairi said, sitting down on the edge of the deck next to him. "You always fall for that no matter how many times I do it. And good morning to you too."

"Oh, yeah, good morning," Sora replied, rubbing the back of his head in embarrassment. He looked down to hide his blush.

Kairi laughed again. "I was just playing, no need to look so down about it. So, what's the occasion?"

"Occasion?"

"You came to my house and waited on my deck for an hour and a half for me to show up. Is this a date?"

"What? Yeah—I mean no—I mean, I was here for an hour and a half?"

"You were," Kairi replied, sliding off the deck. Sora jumped down after her and they both walked down to road leading down to the village.

"I came to see if you wanted to go to the beach, even for a little while. The one on the island."

Kairi smiled at him. "Sure."

They walked side-by-side down to the beach. The sun was already high enough to cast shimmer and sparkles on the sea. The water looked like a treasure trove of diamonds and silver. Walking towards it gave Sora a skip in his step and made him grin.

"This feels great," Kairi whispered beside him.

Sora turned to her with a questioning look. "What does?" he asked.

Kairi blinked, startled by the fact that he'd actually heard her. "I mean… walking along here with you." She was trailing off towards the end. Sora had to lean towards her to hear it.

"I know, right? It's great to be home again. I missed this place so much." He really did. It was all so familiar and yet at the same time everything felt fresh and new. The warm tropical air, the bright sun, the sweet breeze, the amazing blue sky. Sora had been to so many worlds and seen so many new things but he would trade the cobblestone roads of Traverse Town, the cool underwater palace of Atlantis and the loose sands of Agrabah for the packed earth tracks of the Destiny Islands, the warm shallow reefs and squeaky, white beach sand. Everything felt different from how he remembered it, like he was experiencing the island for the first time.

"Yeah," Kairi agreed, "but I mean… it's like…"

"Like what?"

Sora stared at her. Kairi blushed and gulped. She wished Sora hadn't heard her the first time so that he could save her the embarrassment of having to explain herself. She took a deep breath and tried to piece her feelings into sentences. "Never mind," she ended up saying with a defeated sigh.

"Are you sure?" Sora said, stopping next to a wooden lamppost at an intersection. Kairi stopped with him. "You know you can tell me anything, right? We're friends."

"_Best_ friends," Kairi corrected him with a playful smile.

Sora laughed. "Yeah, best friends."

Kairi giggled but the noise died in her throat as her head contemplated how to say what she wanted to say to him. "What I meant was, it's great that you're home too. Now we're all home together. When I was here all by myself it felt lonely. Riku was gone and I couldn't even remember your name."

Sora scratched the back of his head awkwardly and his gaze turned downwards. "Yeah. All the weird stuff that happened to us and kept us apart, that was… I feel bad that I couldn't save both you and Riku straight away. I wish it hadn't taken so long and we could have all been here a year ago."

"Don't blame yourself, Sora. I'm just glad you made it back at all."

"Me too. But hey, it can't have been too bad. You had Selphie, Tidus and Wakka, right?"

"True, but having them here is not the same as having you here… you and Riku."

"What happened? Aren't you guys friends anymore?" Sora inquired quizzically.

"Of course we're friends. I remember, after school every day I would walk with Selphie down to the beach on this road. I would stay there as long as I could, waiting for you and Riku but Selphie always left. She tried to make me leave too, sometimes, saying that we had to go and study or do something more interesting." Sora didn't miss Kairi's frustrated exhale. "Tidus and Wakka went off to do something else. Nobody remembered you and yet everyone just went on as if it was okay. They've changed, Sora. When you see them, you'll know. They didn't wait for you. I did."

Sora's eyebrows rose and he stared at Kairi as if he was also seeing her for the first time. His heart thudded and he knew it wasn't just because he was flattered. Kairi had waited for him, she really _waited_. Her whole life was on hold for him and Riku. The whole world was muted while Sora turned that over in his head. He thought that perhaps now was the time to say it; that thing that he'd wanted to tell Kairi for far more than a year now. He opened his mouth to speak.

Suddenly Kairi looked up, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand. "It's starting to get hot already," she commented. Sora clamped his mouth shut. "We should go. It isn't much fun rowing all the way to the island in the heat."

She reached over and took Sora's hand. Her hands were about half the size of Sora's, absolutely tiny like his mother's. They were also as pale as white pearls. Sora smirked, knowing the real reason Kairi wanted to get to the island as fast as possible: sunburn. Kairi's pale skin burned terribly and then peeled painfully. It stung for days. If they got stuck out on the water when the sun was highest her skin would burn for sure.

They walked the rest of the way to the beach hand-in-hand. People were already out by the time they got there. There were some kids building sandcastles and a few teenagers in the surf. They were playfully fighting each other for the sole rubber tube they had between the four of them. Sora grinned as he watched a boy throw a silvery-blue creature with feather-like flippers onto the knee of the girl who was currently occupying it. He couldn't hold back a snicker when she screamed and flicked it off. He remembered being small and having glauco fights with other children. It was terrifying and fun at the same time and everyone always got scolded by an adult and taken home with stinging, red rashes from the poisonous gel on the creature's body.

The glauco landed on the face of the boy who'd thrown it in the first place. He wiped it off quickly. It still made Sora smile but the joy seeped out of his eyes, replaced by sadness. It was difficult to recall any memories from the main island. He had played with other children – even if he couldn't remember doing so, he knew he must have – but he couldn't remember any other faces. Riku, Wakka and Tidus stood out in the glauco fight memories. Everyone else was blurry. Not just their faces, their whole bodies. Sora even had to imagine new skin tones and hair colours for the others. Why did it seem like his memories were so broken? Was there anyone on his islands who could even answer that question?

Kairi tugged on his arm. "Sora, don't dawdle! Look, two of the boats are gone. That means some of our friends are already there. I hope Riku's there."

Sora turned away from the teens and scoped out the beach in front of them. The boats were stacked against the sand dunes. One of them was half covered in sand. Sora went up and brushed some of the sand away. A crude etching was revealed that at one stage had looked like a self-portrait to him but now just looked like scribbles. Sora's heart sank when he realised that it was his boat. He pulled it away from the dunes and lay it down on the sand. The wood had shrunk a bit, worse than Riku's. He could test it for seaworthiness but just by looking at it Sora could tell that it was going to leak badly.

"I don't think it's a good idea to travel on that thing," Kairi said.

"Yeah…"

"Don't worry, we'll just go together in my boat."

"Really? That's okay?"

"Sure, just help me carry it to the water."

Sora grinned and hugged her. "You're the best, Kairi!"

She laughed and returned the hug fully. The soft swell of her breasts squeezed against Sora's chest. He was suddenly aware of how flush they were against each other and blushed. "You'd think that I was saving your life or something, judging by your reaction," she teased.

Kairi picked up the front end of the boat while Sora picked up the back and they carried it over the sand and into the sea. They waded into the water until it was deep enough to float with both of them in it, staying close to the jetty so that they had something to stabilise against. Sora held onto the boat while Kairi climbed in first. He was about to hop in himself but stopped when he noticed a shadow fall over the boat. He looked up. He grinned. He would remember that curl of ginger hair anywhere.

"Hey! Wakka!" Sora called up to him.

The tall boy looked over his shoulder and grinned from ear to ear. "Hey! I saw you and Kairi coming down here holding hands and all, ya. I was waiting for you two to notice I was here."

Sora grinned sheepishly. "Sorry."

"Ain't even a thing. We woulda met up on the island, ya. That's where you're going, yeah?"

Sora nodded. He could see what Kairi meant when she said 'different'. The Wakka he was looking at now only vaguely resembled the boy Sora remembered. Now Wakka seemed so much taller and bulkier. His jaw was squaring off a lot more and his red hair was creeping down the sides of his face. Sora wondered if they would eventually grow into full-blown sideburns or stop halfway. He still dressed in yellow – yellow overalls and a pair of yellow, rubber-soled sneakers. Wakka raised his arms above his head and stretched them. Sora couldn't help but notice how incredible he looked with a more muscular body.

"If you're going to the island, where's your boat?" Kairi asked. Sora tore his eyes away from Wakka and looked around. He looked under the jetty to see if there was anything floating on the other side but Kairi's boat was the only one in the water.

"I don't need that old thing anymore, ya," Wakka laughed. "I'll swim."

"All the way?" Sora said. He looked out across the sea. The small play island was well within view but it looked far. Sora was certain that it would take him hours to swim there just going one way.

"Yeah all the way, ya. I'm training up for Blitzball."

"Blitzball… Blitzball…" Sora muttered. "Isn't that a game you and Tidus made up?"

"Yep, that's the one. Some of the adults were pretty impressed with our game so they're setting up a league, ya. By this time next year, Blitzball will be an official sport, ya."

"That's so cool!"

"You betcha! I turned in my boat so that I'd have to swim to the island whenever I go. Gotta make it in one breath, ya."

"There's no way you can do that!" Sora exclaimed.

"Nah, not yet," Wakka shook his head. He stood on the edge of the jetty, shaking his muscles out. "But I've done it in three before, ya. Reckon today I can make it two. Whaddya say? I'll race you two to island?"

"I don't think I can even swim that far," Kairi said.

"You'd win by a mile," Sora added.

"What about in the boat? Do ya think you could beat me there?"

"That hardly seems fair…" Kairi started.

"You're on!"

"Sora!"

"What? He's already so good at his swimming, it's not fair to have a swimming race with him. But swimming versus rowing? That's a more even match."

The boat rocked dangerously as Sora jumped in and took up the oars. Kairi sighed but was smiling nonetheless. "Don't go too fast."

"Kairi, it's a race."

"You ready, ya?" Wakka called down to them.

"Only if you are," Sora replied.

Wakka grinned and turned to face the sea. The splash as he dived into the water marked the start of their impromptu race.

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